and that, when he was right, his fpirit did not eafily yield to oppofition.

Having fo lately quitted the tumults of a party and the intrigues of a court, they ftill kept his thoughts in agitation, as the fea fluctuates a while when the ftorm has ceased. He therefore filled his hours with fome hiftorical attempts, relating to the Change of the Minifters and the Conduct of the Ministry. He likewife is faid to have written a Hiftory of the Four last Years of Queen Anne, which he began in her life-time, and afterwards laboured with great attention, but never published. It was after his death in the hands of Lord Orrery and Dr. King. A book under that title was published, with Swift's name, by Dr.

Lucas;

Lucas; of which I can only fay, that it feened by no means to correfpond with the notions that I had formed of it, from a converfation which I once heard between the Earl of Orrery and old Mr. Lewis.

Swift now, much against his will, commenced Irishman for life, and was to contrive how he might be beft accommodated in a country where he confidered himself as in a state of exile. It feems that his first recourfe was to piety. The thoughts of death rushed upon him, at this time, with fuch inceffant importunity, that they took poffeffion of his mind when he first waked for many years together.

He

He opened his houfe by a publick table two days a week, and found his entertainments gradually frequented by more and more vifitants of learning among the men, and of elegance among the women. Mrs. Johnfon had left the country, and lived in lodgings not far from the deanery. On his publick days The regulated the table, but always appeared at it as a mere gueft, like other Ladies.

On other days he often dined, at a ftated price, with Mr. Worral, a clergyman of his cathedral, whofe houfe was recommended by the peculiar neatness and pleafantry of his wife. To this frugal mode of living, he was first difpofed by care to pay fome debts

which he had contracted, and he continued it for the pleasure of accumulating money. His avarice, how. ever, was not fuffered to obftruct the claims of his dignity; he was ferved in plate, and used to say that he was the pooreft gentleman in Ireland that eat upon plate, and the richest that lived without a coach.

How he spent the reft of his time, and how he employed his hours of study, has been enquired with hopelefs curio

fity. For who can give an account of another's ftudies? Swift was not likely to admit any to his privacies, or to impart a minute account of his business or his leifure.

Soon after (1716), in his forty-ninth year, he was privately married to Mrs. Johnson by Dr. Afhe, Bishop of Clogher, as Dr. Madden told me, in the garden. The marriage made no change in their mode of life; they lived in different houses, as before; nor did fhe ever lodge in the deanery but when Swift was feized with a fit of giddinefs. "It would be difficult," fays Lord Orrery, "to

prove that they were ever afterwards "together without a third person."

'The Dean of St. Patrick's lived in a private manner, known and regarded only by his friends, till, about the year 1720, he, by a pamphlet, recommended to the Irifh the ufe, and confequently the improvement, of their manufacture.

For